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Sunday, January 13, 2013

Sunday Survivor - 1941 Bus Schedule

Among the various papers and
mementos that passed to me when my mother died was the bus scheduled pictured
here.The card is small, about the size
of a standard business card, and would easily fit into someone’s wallet.This is a case of an heirloom that was passed
along, but no story has ever been attached to it.It probably was never significant enough to
need a story, but it somehow survived all these years, tucked in with my mother’s
papers.Even though I don’t know who the
original owner was, I’ve held onto it for its historical value.

There’s a scene in the Indiana
Jones movie “Raiders of The Lost Ark” where the rival archaeologist brings out
an ordinary pocket watch, then talks about how it is just a trinket now, but
left buried in the sand for hundreds of years it becomes a priceless
artifact.My little bus card is sort of
like that watch.At the time, it wasn’t significant
for anything other than its intended use.Now, though, 70+ years after it was printed, it can tell me a lot about
the Capital District of New York in the early 1940s.

The first thing you notice when
looking at the card is the bus itself.While to some extent it helps to date the schedule, what it does for me
is to transport me back in time some, when city buses weren’t giant monsters prowling
the streets.I can almost hear the “AHOOOGAA!!”
of car horns as the bus makes its rounds, picking up and dropping off
passengers as they deposit their dimes with the driver.

The next thing that stands out on
the card is the name of the bus company, Albany-Schenectady Bus Lines.It appears to be a private company, available
not just for daily use, but also for “Tours, - Excursions, - Charter.”The president of the company, C. Bohl, has his
name listed right at the top, just before the name of the town of Guilderland,
NY.Guilderland is a suburb of Albany,
and Schenectady is just to the northwest of Albany.These town names give a good indication of which
the towns the bus route likely covered.

Next on the card are the fare
rates.I was curious to see how these
rates compared to today’s rates.While
it’s not easy to compare a private bus line from the 1940s to a public bus line
in 2013, I could do some rough estimating.Running the fare of 10 cents through an inflation calculator,
I found that in today’s economy, 10 cents in 1941 would have the buying power
of about $1.57 today.Looking at the
website of the Capital District Transit Authority (CDTA),
I found that they sell a 10 trip pass for $13.00, or $1.30 per trip.It appears that bus fare in Albany is
actually cheaper today than it was 70 years ago.

Two other things about this bus
schedule stand out for me in a historical sense.The first is the phone numbers: 2-1010 and
6-1010.For someone who grew up dialing
either 7 or 10 digits to make a call, it’s weird to see a 5 digit phone
number.It’s a small thing, but again,
it helps to bring me back in time to an era where phone service was drastically
different than it is today.

The second item is the mention of
the “General Electric Subway”.This one
had me puzzled, since, as far as I knew, there had never been a subway system
in the city of Albany.A Google search
turned up information about a “pedestrian subway” that led to the General
Electric plant in the city.Workers at
the plant would use this underground entrance while arriving or leaving
work.Apparently the entrance has been
closed down for many years, and the tunnel itself filled in, but the small
entrance building and stairs still remain.

Small mementos like this interest
me, even if I can’t find a defined family connection.They show me everyday life as it was during
the times of my ancestors.While it’s
always fun to see something like an 18th century musket or a civil
war cannon, items like bus schedules can give us large amounts of information
about the past, and how life was at the time.It also helps when the item is dated, like this small card, so that they
can be put into historical context.The
rates of this bus schedule, for instance, went into effect on November 10, 1941.

Just 28 days later the Japanese
attacked Pearl Harbor, and the United States entered World War II.

1 comment:

Elroy, I nominated your blog "Green Mountain Genealogy" for the "Blog of the Year Award". You can read more about this nomination at the post at my blog today at this link: http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/01/surprise-ive-been-honored.html Heather Wilkinson Rojo at Nutfield Genealogy

About Me

As a sixth-generation Vermonter living in the same area as my ancestors, I have a great interest in family and local history. This interest has led me further and further into the field of genealogy, which I have pursued as a hobby for the last twenty-five to thirty years. In the past few years I have begun learning more disciplined approaches to the field, and have started revisiting the ancestors that I gathered during my name-collecting days.